Video: Dirty Laundry in the New Mexico Democrat Party

posted at 10:01 am on June 8, 2013 by Jazz Shaw

Hoo boy… Moe Lane at Red State has come across a nasty little piece of business coming out of New Mexico this past week. If the story plays out as early reporting indicates, there are a number of people – including prominent Democrats and a potential gubernatorial candidate – who will have some ‘splaining to do. The story begins in the campaign offices of Governor Susana Martinez, one of the rising stars of the GOP who has already been mentioned as possible POTUS or VPOTUS material in the future. Moe gives us the top line:

Executive summary: Jamie Estrada, former campaign manager for Susana Martinez (now the Republican governor of New Mexico), is accused of stealing* emails from her campaign account and passing them along to Democratic operative (and accused pedophile[**]) Jason Loera. Loera is likewise accused of passing along selected emails to Democratic state chair Sam Bregman, who then used those emails in at least one court case. Loera and Bregman are linked – the former consulted for the latter – and at this point, well. The whole thing is getting quite close to New Mexico Attorney General (and Democrat) Gary King.

The local media is already on this, as the following video shows. But when the story starts out like this, you know you’ve got problems.

How did a hijacked e-mail get into the hands of the head of the state Democratic Party? A federal investigation into the governor’s stolen e-mails has led to child pornography charges against a powerful Democratic operative. And we’ve learned that the person charged with child porn sent one of those hijacked e-mails, which had nothing to do with porn, to the state Democratic Party chairman.

Oof. How’d you like to get up in the morning, pour your first cup of coffee and have one of your minions come dashing in with that particular bit of cheery news to wash down with your bagel? Watch the video below. There’s really not much to do at this point but get out the popcorn, sit back and observe.

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That just makes me more suspicious of converts to Republicanism. A couple might end up being the next Ronald Reagan. More of them end up being the next Jamie Estrada.

Steve Eggleston on June 8, 2013 at 10:15 AM

Do we know that Estrada is a convert? There are plenty of bad apples who start off Republican, you know.

And what’s more, Martinez herself is a convert, and she’s done a damn good job so far. Considering she was the only one with a snowball’s chance to win in a state like New Mexico, we should be pretty thankful.

The second half of your point is bunk. The majority of converts to the party have been its strongest members. The Deep South, which used to be a bastion of the Democratic Party, has completely flipped and become the banner-carriers of conservatism (or at least whatever definition of “conservatism” is in force this week – with all the RINO-hunting going on, I can never keep track of it).

Meanwhile, the biggest traitors among the converts tend to be in the pundit class, who aren’t worth a bucket of warm [spit] for policy anyway.

Oh, leave him alone.
Don’t you know it’s all about feelings of love?
Democrats are leading us to a brave new world based on this principle.
So away with you prudes!
Bring on polygamy, bestiality, marriage to inanimate objects, & the elimination of those Neanderthal age-of-consent laws!

Brava Govenor Martinez !
It will take years to drain the swamp in state and local
offices . Crook Richardson and his machine did a lot
of damage to the ” Land of Enchantment ” .
Recently at least 2 police chiefs in northern counties
were relieved of their positions . Yup , it all trickles down .
Still one of the most enchanting states though .

I’ll gladly give you the final point. Apparently you missed the “next” part of, “A couple might end up being the next Ronald Reagan.”

As for the Deep South, the pre-1970s division between the two parties wasn’t so much about ideology. Conservative Democrats had more in common with conservative Republicans than liberal Democrats, and liberal Republicans had more in common with liberal Democrats than they did with conservative Republicans, and depending on the year, either party could be conservative, either party could be liberal, both parties could be conservative, or both parties could be liberal.

This is all the governor’s fault. If she really was a politician on the rise, she would have been smart enough to have a dozen secret email accounts to do her business. We are defiantly dealing with an amateur here.

New Mexico is a low-population state, but one that has seen a considerable influx of California Democrats over the years to the Santa Fe-Taos areas in the northern part of the state (think Austin and Travis County in Texas, but without the surrounding 200-plus counties there to keep them from doing the governmental equivalent of repeatedly cutting themselves).

So unlike other south and southwestern states, there’s more of a ‘take no prisoners’ mindset to the N.M Democratic Party, where the hardcore activists don’t feel the need to hide their true feelings from the voters, the way Dems seeking power in other nearby states do. As a result, you get stuff like this to go along with some amazing corruption stories at the local level (the link going to a “Democrats Gone Wild” story from Gov. Martinez’s home Dona Ana County).

Welcome to the cesspool of New Mexico politics( I live here). The Dems have controlled both houses for at least 40 years because we are the food stamp/hand out capital of the US. Martinez fired Estrada early on in her run for Governor. Our great AG Gary King has run for every office in the State and passed on going after Richardson for all the crap he pulled in the State

Keep in mind that campaign managers are often not partisan themselves. Well, they aren’t chosen on that basis, anyway. Some of these folks are purely mercenary and work their behinds off to get whoever pays them into office. Unfortunately, that also means there isn’t much loyalty to party platforms or to individuals….

Sounds like a weak case to me. I mean, its not like this was the head of a country using an out-of-control all-powerful free-spening state agency that he heads to block and harass his political enemies, used another agency to spy on 100% of his countrymen, while failing to protect his citizens under attack from foreign terrorists, meanwhile attempting to prosecute the free press then having his henchman lie about it when caught red handed. Call me when you have something like THAT!

Sorry to say, but kind of makes you wonder about Susana Martinez’s (in)ability to judge people’s character.

bofh on June 8, 2013 at 10:24 AM

All mangers make a couple of bad hires. As BuckeyeSam said she realized her mistake and fired him. Sometimes it takes working with someone to see that they really aren’t a fit in the origination. I’d rather have someone give a person a chance and be occasionally wrong then only go with safe choices. To me it’s a risk/reward evaluation.

Former NM Gov. Bill Richardson says this is not newsworthy, because Jaime Estrada is not Democratic enough, Jason Loera is not perverted enough, and Sam Bregman clearly is not Hispanic enough.

BuckeyeSam on June 8, 2013 at 10:22 AM

It’s funny that you bring up Richardson. I was working as a contractor for a week in Albuquerque a couple of years ago and the common consensus there at the time was that Richardson was as corrupt as could be. But that’s raaaacist, I suppose.

Sounds like a weak case to me. I mean, its not like this was the head of a country using an out-of-control all-powerful free-spening state agency that he heads to block and harass his political enemies, used another agency to spy on 100% of his countrymen, while failing to protect his citizens under attack from foreign terrorists, meanwhile attempting to prosecute the free press then having his henchman lie about it when caught red handed. Call me when you have something like THAT!

ChrisL7412 on June 8, 2013 at 11:30 AM

THAT sounds like something you might find in a third world country, somewhere…

Sounds like a weak case to me. I mean, its not like this was the head of a country using an out-of-control all-powerful free-spening state agency that he heads to block and harass his political enemies, used another agency to spy on 100% of his countrymen, while failing to protect his citizens under attack from foreign terrorists, meanwhile attempting to prosecute the free press then having his henchman lie about it when caught red handed. Call me when you have something like THAT!

ChrisL7412 on June 8, 2013 at 11:30 AM

But nothing like that could ever happen in this country.

We are ruled by the most benevolent, transparent, open, enlightened regime in history…headed by a veritable ‘lightbringer’. In fact, THE Lightbringer.
And they are dedicated to our peace, safety and freedom above all things.

I understand your point, but this is more than just not being “a fit in the organization”. This is out and out political sabotage, and diversion of the email an indictable criminal action.

Is the reason for Estrada’s firing known? Martinez’ statement is vague:

I knew the defendant to be a man of suspect character. That is why I fired him from my campaign in 2009 and why I rejected him for a position within my administration after being elected.

He was only “hired” (can you “hire” someone for a nonpaid position?) in July of 2009, so his shortcomings apparently became apparent rather quickly, since he was gone in December.

As an aside, failing to immediately change the domain account password after terminating Estrada (though it was known that he possessed the password and was “of suspect character”) reflects a woeful laxity of security. Additionally, it’s trivially easy to check where the dns is routing email for a domain (“dig susana2010.com mx”), yet the Martinez campaign apparently failed to do this even after realizing that they had lost control of the domain (according to the indictment) when Estrada refused to give them the password on July 18, 2011. They continued to use the email in blissful ignorance until June of the following year, when the original owner apparently noticed the email diversion and convinced the domain registrar to return the account to him.

I’m not into “blame the victim”, but this is pretty basic stuff, especially with the value of a selected domain name to a political campaign.

Not to devolve into liberal debate tactics: “But Mo-om, Johnny’s parents let him…” but on the rare occasions that a Republican is discovered to be a criminal – which the LeftSM inevitably never fail to report – be sure to help spread the word about the rampant crime, thuggery, immorality and lack of ethics that is endemic to members of the Democrat party and unions.
Apologies for the poor formatting

Sounds like a weak case to me. I mean, its not like this was the head of a country using an out-of-control all-powerful free-spening state agency that he heads to block and harass his political enemies, used another agency to spy on 100% of his countrymen, while failing to protect his citizens under attack from foreign terrorists, meanwhile attempting to prosecute the free press then having his henchman lie about it when caught red handed. Call me when you have something like THAT!
ChrisL7412 on June 8, 2013 at 11:30 AM

Did you hear that Mariah Carey probably won’t be back as a Judge on American Idol next year?

Why do Republicans surround themselves with all these shady liberal paid “consultants”? Even the consultants who claim to be Republicans seem to loathe actual conservatives.

The consultant field is such a racket. It sure is troubling that Susan Martinez was in bed with these dirtbags and then didnt secure her computers when Estrada was fired. She looks like an incompetent RINO.

Living in NM for most of my life, I can honestly say that the north doesn’t acknowledge the south – the border on NM is just south of Socorro according to the news stations and anything else that happens in this state. That Martinez who was the DA in Las Cruces (I live there currently) won the election for governor was mind boggling. She is probably the best thing that could happen to this state. Funny thing is – people in the southern part of the state don’t like her – go figure. Anyway, the democrats have had such a strangle hold on this state for so long it’s disgusting. I live in the land of mañana and as for the land of enchantment, it is quickly changing due to the influx of the loons from CA. I am hoping that somehow Martinez can get some changes for the positive in this state before everyone decides we should be the next CA. We need to clean house and maybe this will bring that about.

Living in NM for most of my life, I can honestly say that the north doesn’t acknowledge the south – the border on NM is just south of Socorro according to the news stations and anything else that happens in this state.

MomintheFlyOverZone on June 8, 2013 at 5:52 PM

It’s not just that… if you’re not in the Albuquerque/Santa Fe area, your opinions are unwanted.

New Mexico is a low-population state, but one that has seen a considerable influx of California Democrats over the years to the Santa Fe-Taos areas in the northern part of the state (think Austin and Travis County in Texas, but without the surrounding 200-plus counties there to keep them from doing the governmental equivalent of repeatedly cutting themselves).